Chapter 6

Standing on a bluff made of an ancient skull, looking down into a vast miasmatic bog, and wearing nothing but her shift and her leggings with her sword tucked into a scabbard that hung at her hip, Caelel Silverhawk considered the nature of honesty and the difficult nature of truth telling in the face of diresome threats. Before her eyes, a series of watchtowers were congealing from nothingness, raw mana flowing through the focused efforts of Ruti, the Baron of Rot, his palms spreading as he touched his part of the Realm of Ruin and shaped it to his whim, powered by the souls of the dead that dwelt within his purview. Cae quashed a moment of concern, a feeling of worry, knowing that despite his expression, she had done the mathematics equations: They had enough motes to construct the watchtowers.

It was just a matter of effort and dedication.

Ruti lowered his dark palms and opened his eyes, smiling shyly as he looked upon his handiwork. Each watchtower looked somewhat liked a petrified, hollowed out mushroom, their tall caps reaching wide above the canopy of the swamps and marshes. They had fences around the edges, tarps laid out to keep the merciless sun off the back of the souls manning them, and at their heart, glittering crystals that could be used to send a signal to the center of the Realm – warning of attack, spies, or other trouble.

“That makes this boarder secure against any raiding forces that Pillage might send,” Cae said, rapping her knuckles against her sword for good luck. Her brow furrowed slightly. “Will the souls here be willing to ... man them?”

“They will,” Ruti said, his voice firm. Then, sighing, he thumped back onto the ground. Grass crinkled under his backside and he rolled his head back, peering up at the sky, letting it shine upon his features. He was, as usual, dressed in the most miserly of dregs – rags and rotting scraps of leather. Cae looked up at the sky, rather than risk looking down at him. “I never imagined I’d be able to build so much, I always assumed I’d run out of energy and never tried.”

“That’s why surveying is so important,” Cae said, her cheeks flushing as her finger traced the edge of her sword’s pommel. “I fucked Citri.”

The words popped out of her mouth before she could stop them – the guilt, gnawing at her belly, left her unable to do anything but. She realized, immediately, that they were the most terrible error. It was like feeling a mortal slipping between her arms as she flew high above the clouds, reaching for them ... and knowing it was too late. They would fall, and fall, and fall, and hit the ground and come to red ruin, just like her and Ruti’s relationship. She already began to reach, time seeming as if it was slowing to a crawl, her hand moving to cup over her mouth, as if she could cram the words back into her traitorous throat before they reached Ruti’s ears. But ... no. It was impossible.

It had already been said.

“Um, yeah?” Ruti asked, cocking his head ever so slightly to the side. “Of course you did?”

“I’m sorry, it was in the throws of passion, after a battle, and and I ... I...” Cae blinked slowly, her glowing wings mantling in shock. “Of course I did?”

“I mean, I knew you did,” Ruti said, smiling. “He’s my fellow Baron.”

Cae felt her entire face grow hot, and buzzing, like she had bees under her skin. “He ... t-told ... you?” she whispered, slowly. The idea, of two males discussing her lasciviousness, her wantonness, her sin! It was almost too horrible for her to even consider. And worse, that gentle Ruti was the one who-

“No?” Ruti asked. “Why would he need to tell me?”

Cae blinked, her wings mantling again.

“Anyway,” Ruti said, pushing himself to his feet and smiling at her. “I’m glad you had such a good time with him – did you want to talk about it?”

Cae shook her head, mute in shock.

“Well, then, I need to rest,” Ruti said, stretching his arms behind his back, cocking his head to the side until his neck popped. “Channeling that much magic was more tiresome than I expected.” He reached down and smacked her rump with a single broad palm, making Cae squeak and jerk upright. Her eyes widened – and he froze, then stammered. “S-Sorry, just ... uh ... a flash ... you know, sparks. Heh. Since. Um. Citri, and all. Bye!” He turned and hurried off, walking down the hill, rather than transforming into a butterfly or whatever else he might have done – considering the lack of magic he currently had, having spent so much, it was not surprising.

Cae blinked again.

“ ... I believe I need to study more,” she whispered.

With the Rot boarder secured and with her scouts – including Shale – out to make sure that Pestilence hadn’t marched, Cae practically flew through her remaining tasks as fast as she could, scribbling notes, sending missives, checking on supplies, working out battleplans, and finally, providing a report to Lord Arral, who took it all with a serious nod and a grunted ‘very good, General.’ This left her a chance to slip into her room, move to the drawer where she had concealed Lady Ruin’s journal, and to take the book out. Cae set it down on the bed beside her, her brow furrowing.

The blank pages sat there, taunting her – now with whatever they might hold, rather than their emptiness.

Cae crossed her arms over her chest, her wings folding as well as she considered. Speaking a word searches for it – but what could possibly explain this? She bit her lip. Then ... despite herself, she found herself thinking on the first thing the journal had shown her: The argument between the woman who would later become Lady Ruin and her future husband ... what was it she had said?

“Soul architecture,” Cae said aloud.

The pages flipped as if an invisible wind blew them, and then settled. The two words soul architecture burned into existence, on the upper left edge of one of the pages. More text began to swirl into existence on the page, but Cae didn’t even bother to read it: She lifted her head as the room around her bled away like smoke, and the past took its place. She found herself ... not where she expected. Some ancient sepulcher, some strange and occultic room, something unfamiliar, something ... not...

Not the training halls of Heaven.

They were empty and dim at first. Then, skidding backwards, Alia fi-Fiar, the future Lady Ruin, came into view. She was dressed in simple traveling robes which billowed around her slender form as if caught in a hurricane force wind. She skimmed along the ground on a skein of crackling lightning, her arms spread wide, and a quarterstaff jacketed in brilliant white light hovered between her palms. She twitched her fingers, and each twitching movement caused the staff to twirl, plunge, thrust, shift back before her face – interposing itself again and again against a flaming sword as a heavily armored war-angel that Cae recognized as her Proctor - though a younger, less scarred version of him – sought to cleave her body in twain.

“I see you’re not much,” Alia said, her fingers twitching to bring her staff twirling up to cover her head as the Proctor’s flaming sword swept down. “ ... interested...” Twitch. This time, the staff thrust forward – and it struck against the Proctor’s close faced helmet with a sound not unlike the ringing of a vast, golden bell. The war-angel stumbled backwards with the resounding force of it, a ripple of distorted air blooming around the impact. “ ... in academic curiosity!”

“Corrupted wench! Hells take you!” The Proctor roared, stumbling backwards, his hand going to his dented helmet. “You tore an angel’s soul apart!”

“I did put her back together again – and got permission,” Alia said, her hands lowering so their palms faced the floor. This brought the glowing quarterstaff down low to the ground as well – less threatening.

“You committed a cardinal sin – you broke the design of Heaven itself!” the Proctor growled. “When you put her back together, as you so callously call it, you left the angel in question altered! Changed! Fundamentally!”

“I did?” Alia sounded honestly somewhat taken aback. She frowned and then lifted one hand, snapping her fingers. A familiar book came into being with a flare of black magic. It dropped into her palms and she held it in her left hand while a quill shimmered into existence in her right. “How so?”

The Proctor growled. “You make mock of the Creator herself with your vile blasphemes. Each angel is born of a mortal soul – a soul hewn to perfection by cycles of reincarnation! When a soul is born in Grace, born of Heaven, it ascends to us, and is given wings and angelic might – for it needs no shaping, no tests, it simply is what it is. And you altered such a creation ... you marred an artwork ten generations in creation, leaving-”

“Yes, yes, but how are they different? Is it subtle? Gross?” Alia asked.

The Proctor roared in fury and rushed towards Alia. She clapped her book shut and then thrust her quill out as if it were a weapon – and weapon it was. The feather shot from her palm, shrouded in a red flare, and plunged into the Proctor’s face plate and into his cheek, puncturing it and creating a scar that Cae knew quite well from her time in the Academy. The Proctor kept plunging forward, ignoring the pain and the fire and the blood. His flaming sword swept out and when Alia’s staff interposed itself betwixt him and her, it was shorn in half with a spray of splinters and a crack of splitting stone. Alia’s eyes widened and she skimmed backwards on her glowing lightning.

The Proctor didn’t swing wildly – instead, he held his sword in both hands, waiting for his moment.

Alia didn’t give it him.

She spoke a single word that echoed in the room and distorted space. The walls of the Academy shivered, threatening to crack and break, while one of the pillars trembled in its moorings and then cracked in half. The sword clattered to the floor as the Proctor transformed, in a single flash. When the light faded, Cae saw that he had been reduced to a mouse: Small, white furred, with a bright pinkish-red nose that twitched in what could only be the mouse version of pure wroth. He squeaked and scrabbled wildly atop the armor that had clattered around him. To Cae’s surprise, the same shocking transfiguration had struck the mortal sorceress as well ... and that made the knowledge click in Cae’s mind. The most powerful mortal arcanists could, with great training and effort, speak the same language as the vast Choir that perpetually sang the Creator’s glories in Heaven.

The danger of speaking the language of Creation itself, though, was the word had to be in your mind as you spoke it – and thus, it worked its way upon you as well. Alia had turned herself and the Proctor into a rodent, by speaking that word into being. Cae shook her head slowly – wondering how Alia would...

And Alia vanished in a crackling sparking pop. This caused a horrible sense of dislocation as the illusion shifted with a blurry, smeary suddenness into what was clearly an arcanist’s occult workspace. Mouse-Alia appeared on a summoning circle, and a glowing crystal came to life. Alia’s voice came from it, tinny and echoing, and spoke a single word that, like the prior word of Creation, caused the room to groan and creak. Two alembics cracked, a cauldron spilled, some books flew from the walls, and the window that looked out onto an ancient, desiccated city, shattered outwards in a bloom of glittering particles.

However, it did mean that Alia was once more human. She sighed as she stood in the mess, naked as the day she had been born – and Cae was suddenly, painfully aware that this entry must have been before Alia had been burned, her face showing no sign of the scars that her future self would have. But more ... Alia was truly beautiful, in a way no angel could ever be. Tiny imperfections rooted her in the world, made her a part of it, and just looking at her made Cae feel that squeezing jealousy in her chest that she could never ... be ... that again. She looked away, biting her lip hard as Alia’s voice, dry and clinical, continued to speak.

“All in all? A fairly successful trip – I’ve determined that angelic beings, in terms of their soul architecture, are remarkably similar to humans ... save for one important, telling difference. While the human soul is made of their Pa and Lo souls – to use the Cerantian term for it – an angel appears to have their Pa and Lo souls fused into one, a kind of ... single uber-soul, threaded into their body at several interesting connection points worked into their nervous and skeletal system. The wings, I believe, serve not merely as locomotion, but as a way for the Pa soul to shunt energy normally lost in interspiritual communications into a simple visual effect, as a way of losing the excess motonic energy.” She sighed, and Cae heard a shuffling of robes. When Cae glanced back, she saw that thankfully, Alia had dressed. “There remains the question, then, of how exactly angels dream – for all do, and yet, it is the separation between souls that creates the dream in mortalkind.” She frowned. “Unless the Sages of Cerentius are ... mistaken. But Ming Ha’s architectural theory of the soul has been backed by empirical proofs. There must be something I am missing.”

She sighed, then smiled.

“Well, now, I believe it is time to begin investigations on demonic entities. But for now, I am going to go to the bathhouse. Journal, end.”

The past bled to smoke, and fog, and Cae found herself sitting in her room again, blinking.

She...

Felt...

Dissected.

And annoyed.

“Demon soul architecture!” she snapped, glowering at the book.

Pages flipped and demon soul architecture appeared in the book. The world melted away and when Cae lifted her gaze ... her eyes almost popped out of her head. She was looking upon a vast, comfortable looking bed of red gauze and silk. Sprawled upon it was Alia, her face half covered with a silver mask, concealing any scars she wore. She was completely nude, her modest, dusky brown breasts squishing ever so slightly as they pressed against the bright blue shoulder of a tall, curvaceous blue skinned woman, with two arms to each side, the limbs bifurcating such that one draped over Alia’s shoulder, one cradled her ass, a third held aloft a small glittering wine class, and the fourth held a book crooked between her fingers, thumb popped in to keep the pages from folding shut.

“Mmm,” Alia sighed. “I am beginning to think that you have a very different definition of the word riddle, Kala.”

Kalasta, the Baron of Secrets, chortled. “The answer was spaghetti, mortal.”

“ ... oh,” Alia said, frowning.

Cae slammed the book shut in reflexive shock, her cheeks burning so brightly that she was shocked she had not burst into flames. She sat there for several long moments, then closed her eyes and whispered an oath under her breath. “Fuck.” She had to learn what a demonic soul architecture was – to understand this strange and dangerous world she had found herself within. Besides. It wasn’t as if she was watching for prurient reasons. She was here on an intelligence gathering operation. That was all. She opened the book again, unsure if she would need to ask for the same place ... but no, the world around her bled away and she found herself watching as Alia snuggled up against the four armed former Baron of this Realm of Ruin. She watched as Alia’s dark fingers caressed along Kalasta’s muscular belly, sliding the tip of each between the runnels and lines of her muscles.

“How does a scholar like you get so yoked,” Alia asked.

“You have no idea what strange things demons write their lore upon – you have to shift enough infinite tesseracts of lore up and down shelves, you realize the benefits of working upon your musculature.” Kalasta grinned and sat up. This motion caused her deliciously full breasts to swing fetchingly from side to side, before settling as she shelved them with one of her muscular blue arms. “Now, Alia, I believe that I succeeded in that particular riddling contest.” She smirked. “That means I get to ask of you a boon or a bounty, eh?”

“Mmm, true.” Alia leaned forward. Despite the mask covering half her face, she was more than able to ... Cae couldn’t bring herself to look away ... to fasten her lips around the dark blue-purple nipple that jutted from Kalasta’s breast. She sucked upon her and Kalasta let out a slow, eager sigh, her eyes half closing. The hand that held a book set it aside, so she could caress the top of Alia’s head, fingers brushing through that long, wavy black hair. Alia moaned, licked, sucked, nuzzled at Kalasta’s breast with the eagerness of a ... well, Cae supposed the closest thing she had felt or seen was ... Citri. Her cheeks burned, watching the lewd display – but she tore her eyes upwards to see that Kalasta had a wicked smirk upon her lips, her eyes flickering.

“You do know this won’t distract me from asking of a- ah!” She gasped as Alia drew back and a spark of electricity popped from her tongue to Kalasta’s nipple, forcing the Baron of Secrets to arch her back. “W-What was- oh Hells!” Kalasta moaned as Alia grinned and wiggled her tongue. A rime of frost glittered along the edges of that soft, flexible thing – and Alia ran that edge of frost against Kalasta’s achingly sensitive skin with a vicious, vindictive slowness. Alia wrung from Kalasta a moan that was only muffled when her upper left hand cupped over her mouth, covering it. Kalasta bit her own hand as Alia’s other hand reached up, fondling, squeezing, tugging upon her other breast. She used more force than Cae thought would be pleasurable – and when her fingers slipped away from Kalasta, candle wax glistened upon the demoness’ nipple, bright and recent, as if dripped from a burning wick.

“Oh you don’t play f-fair!” Kalasta gasped as more spots of wax bloomed into existence – all Alia had to do was flick her fingers and they’d seem to splatter, bright reds and pinks against Kalasta’s bright blue skin.

“Mortals are not given a fair lot, we have to cheat,” Alia said, drawing her mouth back. Cool fog blew from her lips, caressing along Kalasta’s tortured nipple – and she waved with her other hand. More hands appeared, shimmering and purple, crafted from raw magical energy. Two plunged down, caressing between Kalasta’s thighs, while another cupped her tit, squeezing her so roughly that the cooling wax cracked off her skin. Another thrust two fingers into Kalasta’s mouth, forcing her tongue down and pinning her head into the pillows. Alia shifted and moved to straddle one of the Baroness of Secret’s thighs. She pressed her tight, hairless brown cunt against the sleekness of Kalasta’s muscle and began to grind herself against her.

Cae dared not even breathe, despite knowing this was mere illusion projected to her from the diary.

“Now, my dear Baroness, was that boon or bountry?” Alia purred.

“Mmph!” Kalasta moaned, unable to get a word out between those fingers teasing her tongue, forcing her lips open. She squirmed and tried to buck her hips, as if she was trying to get Alia off her. But Alia’s magical hands and her flesh hands were both equally merciless. She twisted and tugged on Kalasta’s nipples. She dripped blazing hot wax in a slow, tracing pattern, splatters striking belly muscle, belly button, traveling down and down until they splashed onto the pubic hair that dusted the skin above Kalasta’s sopping wet cunt. Slick, bright lines of blue frost gathered and vanished along Kalasta’s skin as she writhed, moaning desperately.

Alia flicked her finger. Two magical fingers popped from the Baroness’ mouth and she moaned. “Alia!”

“Mmm, not exactly a bounty. Or a boon.” Alia smirked. “Are you forfeiting?”

“No, I-” Alia’s fingers, flesh and magical both, thrust into Kalasta’s cunt. The demoness’ back arched and she wailed in pleasure. “Yes! Oh yes! Oh yes!” She quivered and a warm gush of her demonic girlcum soaked Alia’s palm as Alia smirked, most wickedly.

“Well, since you are forfeiting,” she purred. “I suppose this means I now get to ask my questions, yes?”

“You bitch!” Kalasta laughed, around eager, panting gasps. “You mortal upstart wench.” She closed her eyes, then smiled. “Ask of me any secret you wish to know, whore, and I might grace your ears with their truths.”

Alia chuckled. She rolled away from the Baroness and laid upon her back. Her mask, despite the jostling, remained firmly fixed to her face. The eye that was visible, twinkled as she crooned softly. “Tell me ... there is a link between the Barons and the Lords of Hell. Tell me what it is.”

The Baroness frowned. “Hurm.” She cocked her head. “You’re never going to Heaven, not after that stunt you pulled in the year 7 of Alkezar’s Reign, but...” She settled back into her bed. “Mortals sometimes launch their own little crusades on Hell, to ‘save’ a soul here or there, to try and destroy what lurks in their own hearts. Are you going to bring these secrets to some Sultan or Satrap above? To a magistrate, who will think he at last can kill evil?”

Alia laughed. “Heavens above, you much think me a bigger fool than Degi.”

Kalasta grinned. “Dee does not think you a fool. He merely finds you incredibly annoying. He admits your genius quite candidly.” She sighed, then looked off, to the side. Her smirk was playful, and her eyes knowing. “However, this secret is not for you, sweeting.”

“Hmm?” Alia sounded confused.

“Oh, nothing,” Kalasta said ... and Cae realized, with a cold lurch, that the demoness was peering at her, directly. Fiercely. Cae jerked her head back, opening her mouth – but before she could speak, Kalasta thrust her fingers forward, and Cae felt a strange cold piercing sensation thrusting through her skull. Her vision went gray, then black – and Kalasta chortled. “If you ever wish to review this in that journal of yours, you will see it quite clearly. Your acolytes may have a harder time of it.”

“How cruel!” Alia sounded amused. “You can see the future?”

“One never needs too, if one’s as intelligent as I. Now, the diagram.”

“ ... oh my goodness...” Alia’s voice, once so haughty, so amused, had become awed. Cae reached up with one hand, the other bracing the book open in her palm. She rubbed at her eyes, but that cold spike remained, and she was still unable to see. She scowled so fiercely that she was sure she would rend time and space itself apart, to get at the Baroness of Secrets – but then Alia’s soft voice reached her ears. “Oh that is fascinating. And-”

“Ah, ah, stick to the diagrams, no need to be too vocal.”

Cae slammed the journal shut. “That bitch,” She whispered, her voice hot and fierce. “Secrets! Gah!”

She sat, fuming on her bed, then tossed the journal aside and stood. She stretched her arms, then reached down, tugging her shift straight on her shoulders. Her wings mantled and she lifted her chin. “Enough of this,” she grumbled under her breath, frustration and curiosity both pricking into her flanks, spurs that felt so real and so fierce that she was shocked she did not bleed along her hips. She emerged from her room and stalked down the corridors of the house, seeking ... which room? She considered, for a fleeting moment, going to Citri ... and her knees and her will grew equally weak, thinking of what she might learn there.

New positions.

New sensations.

How it might feel to have candle wax...

He might also actually tell you what you want to know, oh General, her own mind sneered, venomously sarcastic. After he’s made you a slattern once more. Then he can go and boast to Ruti again.

She shook her head and headed to the rear of the house. There, Lord Arral slept – and as rain continued to patter down onto the roof, she came to the large doors leading to his chambers. Two infantrydemons stood at guard there, both nodding to her. “General,” one said.

“Is Lord Arral awake or sleeping?” she asked.

“He’s in conference with Baron Dee,” the other guard demon said, inclining her head, wisps of grayish fog trickling from beneath the mouth guard. “Do you wish to speak to them?”

“Yes,” Cae said, shortly. “Inform them I am here.”

The two guards bowed once more and, through some invisible signal, one ducked into the chambers. A few moments later, the door opened again and there stood Baron Degi, the Baron of Despair. He eyed her with a flinty frown, his glittering, compound eyes pitiless, cold. “What do you require, General Silverhawk?” he asked, sounding clipped and tired. “The Lord and I are in important discussions.”

“I need to understand something – it is vital to the war effort,” Cae said, frowning as she did so. “I have tried to discover the truth circumspectly, but it seems the only way to get a straight answer from you demons is to wring it from you with my bare hands. And so, I am done fumbling in the darkness. Lord Arral will answer these questions, or I will wring it from you with my bare hands, do you understand?” She stepped forward, and Degi took a step back. His palms lifted.

“Can it wait until the morning?” he muttered.

“No,” Cae said, fiercely, not sure what obstructions might crop up between her head hitting the pillow and now. “Let me through.”

“Lord Arral needs a moment to-”

Cae’s ears, sharpened to the subtleties of battlefields, heard the faint click of metal on metal. She frowned. “There’s something in there,” she said, then grabbed onto Degi’s shoulders and strode past him. The Baron of Despair reached for her, his voice a strangled cry of alarm, but Cae was sure of it – that had been chain links clicking together. She saw that there was a reading room, a private library, a roaring and banked fire, then open doors leading back to the bedroom. She was drawn forward by her heedless momentum, and knew already, she was making a mistake ... but by the Creator’s name, she was sick of being forced to step back, to wait, to hesitate, to hold herself in tension waiting for answers or dangers both. And so, she came to the doorway and froze, her eyes widening and wings snapping wide.

Lord Arral was the only one in the room – the metal had not come from some other demon creeping in through the large, stained glass windows depicting crumbling ruins and ancient towers. The light that shone from candles flickered along him and along the chains that bound his arms above and behind his head. He was nude and bound, his massive form forced to his knees, giving her a look upon the Lord of Ruin unlike any that Cae would have ever imagined possible. His form was ... superficially, humanoid. Yes, his skin was the inky black of darkest night, but he lacked the eerie insectoid nature of Dee or the greyhound proportions of Rue, or the flaming sparks of Citri. The only inhuman thing, other than his sheer scale, was the antlers that thrust from either side of his brows.

But then, looking closer, she saw the seams and the lines cut into his skin. There were breaks all through the Lord of Ruin’s body, spots where his skin wished to come apart – and from between those lines, flickering and glimmering, was a light. It seemed to flow through his body irregularly, as if there was a sun contained in his chest, bounding here and there, trying desperately to find a place to escape. His broad chest had a large crack in it, right where his breastbone met the curve of his upper left rib. That crack shone and flickered intermittently as his inner light slipped and shifted. His belly muscles were a cliff-wall of masculine power, heavy slabs that perfectly counterpointed the broad weight of his shoulders, and his thighs were thick enough as well – battering ram legs that ended in powerful hooves, another inhumanity that contrasted beautiful with the rest of his ... his ... sheer perfection.

His cock, titanic as befitted the rest of his body, was contained within a rusted cage of steel, trying to harden and remaining trapped. His lips were bound and gagged. His head was bowed, but had jerked up when Cae entered into the room. His eyes widened and he remained very still as Dee stepped up behind her.

“W ... What is...”

“You need to leave,” Dee’s voice was a low, sharp growl. “This is not for you.”

“You’re ... torturing him!?” Cae snarled. She turned, then grabbed onto the frock of the slender Baron. She lifted him with one hand, pinning him to the wall. “You torment your own master, you worm!”

Dee gasped, then actually laughed. “Angels! Angels!” He cried out. “Heaven save me from Angels!”

“I am no more tormented than I am restrained,” Lord Arral’s voice came, rumbling and amused. Cae turned and saw that, despite the manacles and the chains, he had wrenched his hands free. He stood, and his antlers almost brushed the ceiling.